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This Video Short accompanies this case and can be shown in class or included in a digital coursepack. Instructors should consider the timing of making the video available to students, as it may reveal key case details.

"Bettina's Board Walk" examines the board management methods of Bettina Hein, Founder-CEO of Pixability, Inc., as she prepares for and conducts a standard board meeting. The case is designed to give students an understanding of the delicate dynamics inherent in board management, and to impart best practices for building and managing a board of directors at an early stage startup. The written case is accompanied by video footage for both pre-class and in-class viewing.

learning objective:

To develop best practices for building and managing the board of directors at an early stage startup. Examines issues involved with fundraising, strategic pivots, launching in downturns, corporate governance, and negotiations.

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This Video Short accompanies this case and can be shown in class or included in a digital coursepack. Instructors should consider the timing of making the video available to students, as it may reveal key case details.

This introduction video examines the board management methods of Bettina Hein, Founder-CEO of Pixability Inc., as she prepares for and conducts a standard board meeting. .

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"Bettina's Board Walk" examines the board management methods of Bettina Hein, Founder-CEO of Pixability, Inc., as she prepares for and conducts a standard board meeting. The case is designed to give students an understanding of the delicate dynamics inherent in board management, and to impart best practices for building and managing a board of directors at an early stage startup. The written case is accompanied by video footage for both pre-class and in-class viewing.

learning objective:

To develop best practices for building and managing the board of directors at an early stage startup. Examines issues involved with fundraising, strategic pivots, launching in downturns, corporate governance, and negotiations.

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This is a short case designed to introduce students to a wide variety of choices faced by founders, including whether to quit a big-company job to found a new venture, whether to found with a best friend, how to split the equity within the founding team, how to deal with tensions between the founders, and whether to take on outside investors who will change the venture's strategy and team.

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<p>Description: Bettina Hein, founder-CEO of Pixability, is meeting with her board of directors to discuss her startup's fundraising prospects and the recent strategic pivot. Though Bettina loves the entrepreneurial exhilaration of "riding a rollercoaster every day," the company's current cash position gives them only a four-month runway. For Bettina, though they can at times be tense, board meetings and their preparation have become an exercise in reflection that gives her encouragement. In her prior startup, SVOX, Bettina learned a lot about managing a board of directors. While she can apply many of those lessons to her experience at Pixability, she's had to continue to develop new practices for portraying the company's progress, and for soliciting advice from her directors while projecting confidence.</p><p> While preparing for the upcoming meeting, Bettina wonders: How should she structure and lead the meeting? How might her board react to her team's updates? What difficult questions might the board members pose and how should she answer them?</p>

learning objective:

To develop best practices for building and managing the board of directors at an early stage startup. Examines issues involved with fundraising, strategic pivots, launching in downturns, corporate governance, and negotiations.

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Ockham Technologies' three founders are about to craft their founding agreement and split the equity among themselves. Uncertainty lingers over each member's future contributions, though - how is the team to devise a durable and effective split? Jim Triandiflou and Ken Burows worked resolutely to plan for the launch of their sales management software company. Soon they recruited a third member, Mike Meisenheimer, to lead product development. Each founder had contributed significantly to bringing the Ockham concept to life. The trio had provided the seed capital of $150,000, contracted a development team to build their product, garnered serious interest from a potential investor, and readily agreed on their roles within the company (Jim was CEO, Ken was COO, and Mike was Head of Product Management). But as Ockham entered its initial phase of product development, pressure began mounting for the team to discuss and finalize a founding agreement. What should they include in the agreement, and how should they structure their equity split?

learning objective:

To give students firsthand experience with crafting a founding agreement. Introduces students to business, legal, and tax issues that founders should consider as they contemplate splitting equity and structuring ownership. Also introduces issues that arise in assembling human resources at a new enterprise in the immediate and longer term, as well as the title and role considerations inherent in building a durable team.

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This Video Short accompanies this case and can be shown in class or included in a digital coursepack. Instructors should consider the timing of making the video available to students, as it may reveal key case details.

Harvard Business School Professor Noam Wasserman provides insights on his case "Evan Williams: From Blogger to Odeo."

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